GOVT 86.46 Theories of Racial Capitalism
This class explores theories of the historical relationship between ideologies of racial difference and practices of capital accumulation since the rise of the Atlantic slave-trade. Students will examine the ways in which a host of thinkers, critics, and historians have formulated and employed the concept of “racial capitalism” to reimagine and confront the entanglement of race and capitalism in two central ways: first, as a theory of capitalism in which the movement, settlement, and economic exploitation of people of color is seen as indissociable from regimes of capital accumulation; and second, as a critique of standard accounts of capitalism that view racism as a cultural deviation from the market’s economic logic. Students will be introduced to a wide range of theoretical and historical approaches to interpreting race and capitalism while also learning about key concepts and debates in critical race theory, Black feminist thought, and the history of political economy.